Tag: Advent

December 2019

On: By: Rev. G. Michael Rose

Dear Redeemer Family:
Advent, preachers love Advent. Preparations for Christmas often stir up a combination of anticipation, anxiety, and excitement. The fact that the days are becoming colder and darker in many places brings other connections. Yet, Advent is the season that most honestly names and acknowledges our human condition of longing, waiting, and restlessness. Advent is usually seen in relation to Christmas, and though it is the time of year when listeners face the most distractions due to the many things on their minds and hearts, preachers have the unique role of being spiritual guides, providing time and space for reflection on key spiritual themes.

The lessons of the season can easily lead us into two traps: one in the past and one in the future. The prophecies in the Hebrew Scriptures can cause us to pretend that we are waiting for Jesus to be born as he was two thousand years ago. Some of the apocalyptic lessons can propel us into a distant future, wondering if and when Christ will come again to bring justice and peace to our earth. Though in many ways we are still waiting for the Messiah to come (again), and we need to have a healthy trust in God’s promised future, we are actually invited to wake up to Christ’s presence among us here and now. In the Sunday worship services, we learn to recognize the Lord’s coming week after week, but from there we go to behold anew this Advent coming in the events of everyday life – whether in the news or in our personal circumstances; whether frightening, confusing or even mundane.

The human theme of longing resonates with all of us to some extent. We are always wishing we could delay aging, go back to a certain time in our lives and relive it, or live in an unrealistic ideal situation. In most cases, we fail to embrace fully the present and what is.

Advent puts before us this great mystery: we wait for what we already have. The message of the Gospel serves as a spiritual director, in a sense, inviting hearers to behold anew Christ coming again and again, Sunday after Sunday, day after day, not only in Word and meal, but in the sacramentality of everyday life, day after every single day yet to come. He who was, who is, who is yet to come!
In Christ, Pastor Rose

December 2018

On: By: Rev. G. Michael Rose

“Prepare the way of the Lord.” Matthew 3:3

Dear Redeemer Family:

Company’s coming! It’s time to get ready! In times so long ago we can only imagine, those keeping watch over a town or village would be the first to spot movement along the road. The good news of the company’s safe arrival would be shouted from the heights to those standing guard, or simply waiting, down below. The great bar pinning shut the castle or city gate would be shoved aside, the heavy door pulled open. At night, servants with blazing torches or lamps of oil would go running out to meet the approaching party and light the way. Exhilaration and joy would surround the travelers as they were ushered inside. The hosts would feel delightfully torn between pressing the visitors for all the latest news and leaving them alone for a while to refresh themselves and rest. Soon there would be time for feasting and mutually satisfying conversation.

Company’s coming! But now in these last days, even as gated communities are beginning to reappear, retinues with oil lamps are not. And so, as our own guests are en route, we watch the weather channel, tune in to traffic reports, call the airline to monitor a given flight’s progress. We mail and email maps or information about ground connections; perhaps we ourselves drive to the terminal and idle in a passenger loading zone, or more likely, the cellphone lot until we’ve just about memorized the messages repeated on the boards. Once our guests and their luggage have safely arrived, we feel delightfully torn between wanting to exchange all the latest news and allowing them to recover from jet lag.

Company’s coming! Not some stranger or supervisor we have to impress, but friends or family whose love for us reaches across time and distance and makes us eager to get ready. Once our company gets here, we won’t have to go out of our way to dazzle them with constant entertainment. Just being with them will be enough. Good shared memories will surface and surround us. A walk, or cup of coffee, or even a simple task undertaken together will become the substance of future memories. Because of the love and friendship that have drawn and kept us together, we trust that the visit will turn out to be one of the highlights of our year, and of theirs.

Company’s coming! Our Church year begins with this sense of joyful anticipation, of looking forward to welcoming one who loves us: Christ, the guest, who is already on the way.

Company’s coming! It’s time to get ready. We prepare as we’re able so that the visit can proceed. Once our guest has arrived, we want the focus to be not upon all that we have done to prepare, but upon the visit itself. During Advent we make ready at home. We make ready in church as well. Liturgical paraments and vestments in shades of blue mirror the deepening night. Candles flicker against the growing darkness. Away from the malls and traffic jams the liturgy helps us to create space where we can prepare ourselves and keep watch for Christ, the guest. It is love, the guest, who is already on the way; whose power is stirred up for our sake. Christ is journeying toward us. Let us prepare the way. Let us be prepared to welcome Him!

Pastor Rose